Aaron Polson: The Good Daughter

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

The Good Daughter

 By

Aaron Polson

While Evie labored at her morning chores, she dreamed of crushing her sister’s skull. The dream came in short, simple bursts and often ended before blood spilled. It was enough to imagine the act without consequence. Each morning, Evie lugged heavy buckets of feed for the calves, cleaned five stalls, and collected fresh eggs from the hens, all while her sister, Lanie—Lanie the angel—slept in her warm cocoon, nestled snugly in the only bedroom with a southern exposure. Even during the long, cold drag of winter, Lanie’s room faced the sun. It was warmest room in the house.

Evie hated Lanie the angel.

She bent to the hard, frost-abused ground, and pulled a stone from packed earth. A cold, smooth stone as grey as Papa’s eyes. She imagined what it might feel like to smash her sister’s skull with this stone. She supposed it wouldn’t crack like an egg. Not exactly.

So, why did we take this story?  We were drawn to the world building and particularly the way much is left unsaid; we get enough context to understand the situation and character and, while it’s a “small” story in the sense that it deals with a single family’s dilemma, there are hints of real world issues that raise the stakes for those of us living in a gender-unequal world. The emotional core is quite solid too. We had some issues with vagueness and incomplete escalation. Aaron dealt effectively with these problems in rewrite. The original was 2000 words; the rewrite came in at 2300 words;  final edit is 2240 words.

Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 6 days left to grab some nifty incentives.

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Dawn Lloyd: To Give the Perfect Dewdrop

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

To Give the Perfect Dewdrop

 By

Dawn Lloyd

He created me to find dewdrops for his home on the star, and I can think of no greater joy than to present him with the perfect dewdrop—pure, round, smooth. Beyond that, I have only one wish. A selfish one. I wish for wings so that I might carry the dewdrops to him myself, hear him say, “Well done, my servant.”

In the weeks that he fashioned me, I watched dimly as he molded my legs from saplings growing by the cliff, my arms from currents eddying at the river’s edge, my hair from the spiderwebs that gleamed in the early dawn. When he finished and waved for the wind to lift me high, I asked for wings.

So, why did we take this story?  The concept enchanted all four of us, but most of us had problems with a lack of story arc. Great idea that went to a good place, but the middle didn’t escalate well enough. We asked for a rewrite and Dawn came through with a revision that delivered a much stronger story experience while preserving the elements we all enjoyed. The original was 1300 words; the rewrite came in at 1400 words;  final edit is 1400 words.

Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 7 days and only $9 to $2200.

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Christopher Nadeau: The Party

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

The Party

 By

Christopher Nadeau

He tells everyone at the party Jackie is his love interest in an alternate universe and they all laugh because they don’t know it’s true.

They think his name is Curt because that’s how he’s known here and he does nothing to dispute it. He has no reason to tell them the truth and every reason to keep it from them. He has nowhere else to go.

At one time, he was someone else. He doesn’t remember much about that, though. He still experiences the occasional flashback. Or is it a flash-sideways? Does that matter?

Curt, whose name was, he thinks Alan, was not anything like the man people perceive here. Alan was a rather angry type, prone to fits of rage and violence, a text book borderline personality. People feared him for good reason.

So, why did we take this story?  It’s a strange bird, this one, but the voice pulls you into another reality. Before you know it, you’re invested. All three of the editors who first-read the piece liked it, though two of us typically like plot-driven SF. It’s the strongest salmon that makes it to the breeding grounds, I guess. We strive for variety in approach and voice and this one certainly adds to that ambition.  The original was 3000 words; final edit is 2760 words.

Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 8 days and only $9 to $2200.

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H.L. Fullerton: Twilight’s Last Gleaming

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

Twilight’s Last Gleaming

 By

H.L. Fullerton

Banthany checked the clock. Seven fifty-eight. Oscar would be done with dinner–his family ate late because his mom didn’t finish work until six. Night wouldn’t fully arrive until eight-fortyish, but it was dark enough now. Out his window, specks of light flared against the purpling sky. Banthany ran down the stairs and called, “I’m going out.”

His mom appeared in the living room entryway. “Where are you going?”

“Oscar’s. To watch the fireworks.” His hand was on the doorknob.

“If you see Sandhya Guptamurthy, remember to tell her, ‘Best voyages.’ And I don’t want you on the roof.”

Guess where he goes?  .

So, why did we take this story?  All four editors gave it a thumbs up.  It does break “the rules”, but that’s not why we took it. We took it because it achieves what it sets out to achieve.  The concept is excellent, the execution sharp, the perspective a bit unusual, and the payoff fits perfectly. You can’t help but like the protagonist even if he’s not particularly active within the story. The emotional core of the piece is what provides its power. The original was 1260 words; final edit is 1220 words.

Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 11 days and roughly $0 to go. That’s right, we made it thanks to you generous people out there. No reason to stop giving if you’re so inclined. What’s left in the pot this year will go toward increasing our pay rate next year.

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James Beamon: A Lack of Charity

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

A Lack of Charity

 By

James Beamon

The compass ceased  its frenzied pulsing and began to bleed from its seams. Will stopped the car. Originally a pristine pearl white, the Buick was now a beaten up and weary warhorse that was always eager for rest.

He was here. Wherever here was.

A field of golden wheat stretched from the highway. A man, shadowed against the deepening reds of dusk, was finishing his work. Will tensed. This must be Chainer. The compass always led to Chainer. He entered the field. The air was heavy with dust.

So, why did we take this story? We didn’t at first. My advice to the author was to sub this to the horror zines, but if he was inclined to take a stab at revising with my extensive notes in mind, we’d be happy to take another look. Happily for us, he did revise and the revision was so much stronger that I had no hesitation about sharing it with the other editors. It did well enough (two thumbs up and two maybes) that we accepted the rewrite contingent on his willingness to rework the opening to remove some false mystery. The original was 4000 words; the rewrite came in at 3000 words; final edit is 2650 words. The power that was always there now shines even brighter.

Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 12 days and roughly $0 to go. That’s right, we made it thanks to you generous people out there. No reason to stop giving if you’re so inclined. What’s left in the pot this year will go toward increasing our pay rate next year.

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M. Yang: The Last Cyborg

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

The Last Cyborg

 By

M. Yang

Randy Ennis’ implants were killing him. He heard it in his dreams—liver talking to heart talking to legs, talking to ears. It wasn’t supposed to be like that, of course. He had designed the medical implants to function as a unit, the way his own body functioned as a unit controlled by Randy’s brain. He didn’t understand it. Nobody did. It wasn’t that the implants didn’t work. It was that they worked too well, every new organ adding its voice until they overwhelmed the body they were in.

Randy paused his work, leaning on his oversized broom. A lousy inch of snow had fluffed over the Grosse Pointe Country Care Facility, not enough to even bother with the shovel. The orderlies said it was their job, he shouldn’t bother at all, but he suspected they secretly appreciated his help. At age ninety-six, he didn’t sleep much and this gave him something to do in the mornings.

So, why did we take this story? This one definitely swam upstream. My reaction to the first version we saw? “Oh, Dear Deity. There is so much wonderful here, yet the story is shaped all wrong.” But it was such a cool classic SF concept, we couldn’t bring ourselves to say no. We asked for an extensive rewrite and M. Yang delivered. The revised version was much stronger. We did a little more tweaking in final edit to speed up the opening. The original was 3400 words; the rewrite came in at 3800 words; final edit is 3600 words.

Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 13 days and roughly $0 to go. That’s right, we made it thanks to you generous people out there. At risk of destroying my macho image, I’ll admit it brought a tear to my eye. I’d like to think Ann would be proud. I know she would be happy. She almost always was.

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Jaime Lee Moyer: Ocean Daughters

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

Ocean Daughters

 By

Jaime Lee Moyer

Six coins–all the money I had left in the world.

I let them fall, copper and silver bright against rum-dark cloth. Madame Kasa scooped them into her long fingered hand, claiming payment before I’d time to change my mind. Her eyes were blue, not with the brightness of summer skies, but dark as storm tossed waves. Flickering candles and smoky oil-lamp light darkened them to shadows in a rouged and powdered face.

“I can’t tell you what to do, Lina,” she said. “I look for signposts of what you might try, nothing else.” Candlelight glinted off jet buttons down the front of her dress, painted ghost-shadows on the wallpaper behind her. She shook her head; gold earrings jangled. “I can’t give you a way to bring Ilya back. Truth is I don’t think you can.”

So, why did we take this story? This one was a unanimous selection by all four editors. We like the tone of it; we like the twist it brings to a “standard” idea. We particularly like the character portrayals. The problems we had were in its pacing, particularly early on, and in a bit of withholding that weakened the later reveal. Jaime fixed these issues in revision and here we are.  The original was 3730 words; the final edit is 3660 words.

Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 14 days and roughly $700 to go. Thanks to everyone who has donated so far.

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John Walters: The Customs Shed

As I receive contracts and final edits from authors, I’ll post a teaser from their story here and on our Facebook page.  You know where to get the rest, right? Comments are welcome.

The Customs Shed

 By

John Walters

    I had got lost somehow. It was near twilight and the foliage above me cast long shadows over the river. I had been wandering upstream, trying to find a place to cross. All around was wilderness, which was disconcerting because I had always related to a place in terms of its buildings.

When the darkness was nearly complete I curled up within a natural grass-lined hollow and tried to sleep.

As I began to drift off, a swarm of something like moths attacked – but they were not moths. They nibbled away at my skin. It did not hurt at first, but my skin became tender, and my apprehension turned into fear.

So, why did we take this story? Mainly for the excellent idea, but we also liked the voice of it. The prose is deceptively simple,  pastoral, even passive, but builds a steady, comfortable cadence that creates the right mood for where the story takes us (and it is a strange place to be sure). Our initial vote was not unanimous. While all four editors appreciated the core idea and liked the character, we were divided on issues of pacing and emotional climax. The story sagged through the middle and the climax was not as sharp as it should be. We asked for a rewrite and John efficiently and effectively removed the middle sag, improved the overall prose, and amped up the ending. The original was 4400 words; the rewrite came in at 4100 words; the final edit is 3840 words.

This is not atypical for a story we take. He will be paid for 4100 words. We never cut words to save money, but to improve the story. Tune in tomorrow for our next tease. The full Table of Contents is here.

Have you checked out our Kickstarter project yet? 15 days and roughly $800 to go. Thanks to everyone who has donated so far.

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Table of Contents

Image via Wikipedia

I’m writing this from Bill Moran’s living room where the Sunday Writers are ranking short story submissions to Parsec’s annual Short Story Contest. We received 100 submissions this year and it’s our duty to weed these down to the top 10, which will go to the final three judges: Timothy Zahn, Mary Turzillo, and Diane Turnshek. Of these 10, 3 will be selected to receive cash awards and possible publication in the Confluence program book.  Our pre-readers knocked the original 100 subs down to about 30 for the Sunday Writers. As one of the pre-readers, I can state that submissions were generally strong this year, though most suffer the same sorts of flaws we see in Triangulation submissions. Hook opening frames that don’t add enough to the story, stories telling about ideas or developing worlds without sufficient story movement, characters talking for the readers’ benefit rather than their own. I guess what I’m saying is that the prose quality was pretty darned high, and where most submissions fail is in their story structure.

Reading 100 stories has siphoned significant time away from what I WANTED to do this week, which was to get all the suggested edits and contracts out and to do the story critiques I owe people. I did read through one such story (4 times!) and have my analysis in mind. That should go out tomorrow at long last. I’ll do the others, hopefully one per day.

Speaking of Table of Contents, Jamie and I have just “finalized” that for the anthology. This is pending receipt of edits/contracts from authors, but should be close. Drum roll please…

“A Claw from the Western Paradise” by Gwendolyn Williams

“The Good Daughter” by Aaron Polson

“Ghost Dogs and Dream Horses” by Shanna Germain

“The Gold in the Straw” by Amanda C. Davis

“The Bright Air That Breathes No Pain” by Eric N. Schaller

“Boll Weevil” by Nathaniel Lee

“The Customs Shed” by John Walters

“Ezekiel” by Desmond Warzel

“Ocean Daughters” by Jaime Lee Moyer

“City of Bones” by Deborah Walker

“In Ruins” by Jo-Anne Odell

“In the Shadow of God There is Fire” by Sandra M. Odell

“Lord God Bird” by Sarah Frost

“Norms” by Cynthia Ward

“To Rule, Do Nothing” by Tristan Davenport

“Zafir the Saudi Superhero” by Madhvi Ramani

“Twilight’s Last Gleaming” by H.L. Fullerton

“A Lack of Charity” by James Beamon

“To Give the Perfect Dewdrop” by Dawn Lloyd

“The Party” by Christopher N. Nadeau

“The Reel” by Helen Tarzwell

“The Last Cyborg” by M. Yang

“A Feast of Kings” by David Sklar

“The Charnel Pit” by Stephen Gaskell

“God in the Machine” by Charles Brownson

“Seedling” by Eric Zivovic

“The Loss of Pain” by Amy Treadwell

“Mikeys” by Robert J. Sawyer

If that isn’t enough to sell you on this year’s collection, I’ll be posting teasers from select stories in the coming weeks.

Stoked yet? I am.

If you’re so inclined, head over to our project at Kickstarter and drop a few bucks into the communal pot. We’ll surely appreciate it.

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Post-Slushy update

Image by Marshall Astor

This week I’ve been working behind the scenes to bring the anthology together. The editors melded minds and decided on the final selections. The way we managed this was that we gave each of our four editor/readers an editor’s choice selection from the 16 stories still in hand. After purchasing those four, we had room for another few thousand words, so I collated editor rankings and we collectively took the longer, more ambitious of the top two (which tied). We may also take another flash but we need to put together the table of contents first to see if we need that sort of change of pace. We’re holding two short flash pieces that are pretty good, but need a little work. We should know after June 5, when we meet to discuss the ordering of stories.

Jamie and I split up manuscripts and we’ve made suggested edits, which I am beginning to send out to authors along with the formal contract. I’m finding that I’m mainly focusing on trimming and rearranging openings. We writer types sure seem to be fixated on getting that necessary background in there, even if it means delaying the story. I’m guilty of that too.

The most important development is that we have launched a kickstarter project. One of the founders of Parsec Ink died earlier this year and we’re scrambling a bit to lock in funding to launch the collection. Like priming a pump, is how I see it. We just don’t have enough up front money to launch, but issue sales do eventually break even. This year we hope to do better than that by launching various e-book formats as well as the print anthology. We also hope that people will support the print anthology by purchasing a copy and/or getting the word out through social media and word of mouth. Anyone who likes short speculative fiction should enjoy this collection. Reviewers certainly have these past few years.  We’re proud of the job we do and, particularly of the authors who send us some amazing work.

Please check out our Kickstarter project and spread the word that it exists.  I hope I’ve provided some useful feedback via this blog and the behind the scenes work I do for the anthology. I hope people will see the value of what we do and support the anthology in whatever manner makes sense for them. That’s my wonderful wife in the video by the way.

I’m a crappy self-promoter, unfortunately, though I’ve been trying to do better. For me it’s not about the sales but the work itself. Lousy way to fill a pantry ain’t it?

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